Find out the eight best practices to optimize conversions on your blog!

Besides offering real valuable content for your readers, conversions on blogs are essential for any digital strategy. Those actions are always related to your marketing goals, and the more you adopt them, the bigger is your success.

8 best practices for blog conversion rates

Optimizing blog conversion rates is one of the main Content Marketing goals. However, you can’t get to that unless you unify and align your strategy with the best practices

There are different types of conversion, and each business needs a specific one at a given moment. That is part of a strategy in a particular context, and in this case, optimization is vital.

Those are the practices that make it possible to have your reader take some relevant action. 

In this post, you will know the benefits of improving your conversion rates and learn eight ways of doing that.

We’re going to cover:

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What are the advantages of raising blog conversion rates?

Boosting the average conversion rate on your blog makes perfect sense, and it’s worth all the effort of your marketing team. After all, that is a differential advantage.

They are not just a number: it indicates that you’re closer to your target audience, that you’re achieving your goals, and that you’re reaching a lot of people with your blog.

Next, you will learn the main benefits of the conversion rate optimization and how the numbers generate a positive impact on a content strategy. 

Engage the reader

If a blog is generating more conversions, that means your reader connects with the published content. Each piece contains a call-to-action that leads people to decisions, which they only follow along if they consider the information valuable. 

As for the conversions, if the numbers are increasing, you can interpret that as a result of good, strategic work. Therefore, it’s natural to see users utterly engaged. 

The more readers are satisfied with those blog posts, the more they will convert.

Achieve your company’s goals

Generally, a company’s marketing plan is developed according to its primary goals. Different scenarios require different purposes, like increasing sales, expanding the leads database, or simply expanding the business. Conversions are essential for achieving those.

Not to mention that each conversion is an action. For instance, if your business aims to boost sales, each unique purchase is a conversion. That’s why your blog content must prepare the reader for the next step in the final stage of the journey. The next step, in this case, is the purchase itself.

Improve business metrics

In this Digital Transformation era, metrics are vital for leaders to have an analytical and precise vision of the overall performance. Numbers are extremely valuable, and that’s why they need to be looked into very carefully. 

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Even though metrics demand some effort in handling them, they are essential and provide indicators worth of attention.

A blog’s purpose, at any stage of the strategy, will be driving action from the target audience. If the conversion rates vary too much, there is a problem with how the content stimulates it.

When there are more conversions, metrics improve. And that’s a concrete result, beyond merely the raising of numbers. 

When is it time to go for more conversions?

Achieving conversion on your blog is always an important goal, but there are moments, under different circumstances and strategies, when it becomes even more urgent and relevant. Then, it’s time to take action.

Now, let’s dive into the different scenarios where you might need to optimize conversions.

When the sales team needs more leads

To be able to sell something, your sales team needs leads. People more likely to buy and interested in what your company offers can be good leads. That can bring you more conversions.

Offering useful content and creating a newsletter are some ways to drive more conversions. After all, those are key-aspects for capturing information from customers, which is essential for any email marketing strategy. 

When conversion rates are low

Low conversion rates must raise a red flag for your marketing team! However, a blog not driving action does not necessarily mean it’s full of bad content.

There are many things to take into account. Even the website structure and the conversion path can drive people away from your brand. The important thing to do is to try to understand the problem’s origin to fix it and work on other strategies that lead to more conversions. 

When there are excellent opportunities for increasing sales

Opportunities to increase sales come at specific moments: the release of a new product, products on sale, special dates, etc. 

That’s when the blog becomes a vital tool to help the reader convert. It’s crucial to leverage those moments and create content that leads people to the buying decision

What are the 8 best actions to improve your blog conversion rates?

Getting more conversions is not an easy task. There is no magic formula. However, if you move in more than one direction, you will undoubtedly see better results. 

Next, we’re going to review the eight best practices and their effects.

1. Reduce the ads

Ads are efficient, and they inevitably generate revenue. No doubt about it. But are they really essential to your blog? Think about it: many of them cause problems with website navigation and produce visual noise.

Don’t forget that the user experience, while reading your blog, is a key-aspect for optimizing conversions. 

So, what you have to do is to reduce the number of ads and always prioritize the reader’s experience on the conversion path. After all, if they can’t use your website and blog easily, they will end up annoyed and unsatisfied. Make sure to leave only the most profitable ads and place them where there’s no distraction for website visitors.

2. Work on the footer

Speaking of visual noise, there’s the footer. It’s an area that usually is always too busy and full of information, which can be distracting and non-effective. That’s another case of user experience and has a significant impact on average conversion rates. So, always keep the footer clean.

Generally, that’s where you place your CTAs. So, the more information you have there, the harder it’s for people to understand the article and the message.

If the footer is busy, a reader may not pay attention to your call-to-action, which means that you won’t convert that user.

3. Develop eye-catching CTAs

The way you suggest action to your reader is crucial to the conversion rate optimization. A good CTA has to be clear, engaging, precise, and needs to contain social proof. Make sure that it’s not arrogant, though, and to keep your word and deliver what you’re promising.

CTAs are the final part of each content, after having your user educated with something relevant. At this point, depending on the stage of the funnel, people might be on the verge of making a decision. 

Then, the CTA’s message must be a complement that stimulates conversion, which means, must be a slight push the readers need to go and finally decide. This way you can build a good email list to engage your leads.

4. Deliver valuable content

Content marketing is a strategy that benefits both sides: on the one hand, people are eager to consume essential information for them, while on the other hand, the business creates those pieces seeking revenue. Conversions are somewhere in the middle.

However, if you want this win-win relationship to happen, it’s important to deliver real value to those reading your content. Producing great pieces that present practical solutions and matches the demands of your persona is crucial. The better your content, the more lead generation.

5. Promise some bonus offer

An excellent piece of content will leave the reader hungry for more. So, offering something else is actually a great strategy for driving more leads.

At the end of the piece, why not offer an article to complement what’s been said? Or why not offer a free trial of your product? Chances are your user will be highly interested. So, in exchange, you can demand their email address by leading them to a sign-up form.

6. Prefer simple and precise landing pages

The landing page (LP) is a crucial element to generate conversions on your blog since it captures data from people while making a promise. But don’t forget that the customer wants to have access to the promised content as fast as possible.

So, to increase your landing page conversion rate, it needs to be clear and precise. Don’t make your website visitors wait, ask for their information with a straight-forward approach. The LP has to present some info on the content, and the visual design needs to be attractive.

You can always use a split test (also known as A/B test) to put two or more versions of a landing page to proof and see which one generates more conversions.

7. Offer easy-to-access sign-up fields

Another way to get lead generation and conversions is by using newsletter forms. You can use them on your CTAs, at the end of articles, and on your banners. One good thing to keep in mind is that you have to make it easy to find.

So, what are the best practices? First, make it simple, clear, and precise. Second, you have to place it where it grabs the user’s attention.

One perfect example could be a small, eye-catching input box with: “insert your email to receive more content regularly”.

8. Go easy on CTAs on the sidebar

If used correctly, the blog’s sidebar is an important area of your site since it’s easy to get the attention of someone visiting the page. It’s powerful, and that’s why many blogs don’t make good use of it, choosing a busy combination of banners and CTAs.

That visual noise only keeps people from actually understanding the purpose of each image and text. So, an area that could be great for conversions becomes underused. That’s the reason why you need to be careful with the sidebar. If you do that, your CTAs will convert more.

Blog conversion rates are part of a marketing strategy that implies good results. Those tips can be valuable for you and your content planning, so, follow each one of them to see your rates increasing significantly. 

If you want to know how your page speed can affect your overall performance, check out this free infographic!

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